Bibiano Fernandes doesn't feel need to prove anything or need to lie about it

People are always asking Bibiano Fernandes why he isn’t in the UFC. Maybe that’s because, not so long ago, he almost was. Or maybe it’s because that’s just what people ask fighters, especially the ones who had offers on the table and chose not to sign.

The answer he gives when faced with this question doesn’t always make sense to people. He did it for the money, said Fernandes, who’s currently ranked No. 7 in the USA Today Sports/MMAjunkie.com MMA bantamweight rankings.

“The UFC is good, but I’m not trying to be famous,” Fernandes told MMAjunkie.com (mmajunkie.com). “I’m not. I’m trying to take care of my family. I don’t care about proving I’m the best guy on the planet.”

That sounds strange, coming from a pro fighter. Maybe we’ve just been conditioned by all the cliches to think that every fighter is in this sport to prove he’s the best in the world. In the minds of most MMA fans, that means gunning for the UFC title. After all, as UFC president Dana White loves to remind us, the UFC is where the best fight the best. So why would a fighter want to be anywhere else?

But according to Fernandes, who won both the bantamweight and featherweight titles during his time with Japan’s DREAM organization, the UFC’s offer to him in 2012 wasn’t anywhere near as lucrative as some might have imagined. Instead it was a starting point, Fernandes said. Not as profitable as the offer ONE FC made him, which helps explain why he’ll be fighting Koetsu Okazaki in the Philippines on May 31, as the two vie for the ONE FC interim bantamweight title at ONE FC 9.

You could argue that winning that title wouldn’t be anywhere near as meaningful as winning the UFC’s 135-pound strap (which also happens to be stuck in interim purgatory just now), and you might have a point. Just don’t expect it to mean much to Fernandes, who is unflinchingly honest about his own goals in the sport.

“I’ve proved a lot of things by fighting,” Fernandes said. “All my life, I fight and fight, one challenge to [the] next challenge. I know one thing today in my life: I proved everything I needed to prove. I won belts. I won tournaments. I fought guys like Urijah Faber when I’m just starting. This all helped me to become the person I am. After every loss I grow more. That’s who I am. But when the UFC came to me and tried to make a deal, it made no sense for me.

“The UFC is great. But I have three kids. I have a family. I have responsibilities. I can’t do that.”

To understand how it is that a pro fighter like Fernandes could prioritize guaranteed money over a chance to compete in the world’s most well-known MMA organization, it helps to know how he got here in the first place. And to do that, you have to go back to Manaus, Brazil, where he grew up on the edge of the rainforest.

For the first part of his life, Fernandes said, he was “a city boy.” But when he was seven years old his mother died, leaving his father with five kids he didn’t know how to care for. This is how Fernandes, still just a child, ended up living with his aunt and his cousins in the rain forest.

“Anything you want to know about the jungle, I can tell you,” Fernandes said. “For me, it’s not bad. Those experiences in my life make me who I am today. It made me a better person, better father, better everything. I appreciate things more.”

It was malaria that finally drove him out of the jungle, Fernandes said. As a child he came down with a bad case of it, one that nearly killed him, and one that he still remembers for the violent shivering bouts that came around every evening at the exact same time.

“You shake, shake, shake,” Fernandes said. “Freezing cold, but also very hot. It’s crazy. And it was every day at 6 p.m. I’ll never forget it.”

His aunt told his father it was time to bring him back to the city, where he could be treated. Because, as he put it, “In the jungle, there’s no IV. In the jungle, if you’re sick, you’re sick.”

Back in the city Fernandes got well, but his family’s economic situation hadn’t improved. He worked cleaning houses, just barely getting by.

“But for me, I always looked for the good thing,” Fernandes said. “It doesn’t matter if things were bad, I look for the good thing. I think that’s important.”

The silver lining this time came when a woman whose house he cleaned offered to pay for him to attend a jiu-jitsu class along with her son, Fernandes said. He showed an aptitude for it right away, but didn’t have the money to keep training. He told his coach he’d have to quit.

“My coach told me, ‘Bibiano, you clean the gym every day,'” Fernandes said. “‘You clean the mats, clean everything, then when everybody leaves you turn off the lights.’ I did that for six years. I’d go to school, clean the gym, clean the house of this coach I had, and his mother would cook for me. And I’d train. Just train and train and train. People trained there for years, and I was beating them. When I was a blue belt I was already tapping out black belts. I think my coach saw that and wanted me to keep going.”

That’s exactly what Fernandes did. He kept going, kept winning, and it wasn’t long before his desire to test himself further led him to MMA. In his second fight, he faced Urijah Faber. In his third, he took on Norifumi “Kid” Yamamoto. He lost both bouts, then won seven straight over the next three years.

And still people want to know why he isn’t willing to take less money upfront in order to get his shot in the UFC.

“I fought with everybody,” Fernandes said. “I don’t have to prove. People say to me, ‘Why aren’t you there? You could be there.’ Why do I need to be there? I’ve already proved myself.”

Again, not exactly the kind of thing you expect to hear from a pro fighter, especially one who’s 13-3 and seems to be still discovering the limits of his talent. Then again, there aren’t a lot of fighters who have lived through what Fernandes has. Maybe there also aren’t so many who are willing to be quite as honest.

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